


there’s a piece of me that leaves (when you’re gone)

by artificialmac



Series: Miss Vanjie and Other Phrases to Say While Walking Backwards [5]
Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Drabble, Drabble Collection, Emotionally Repressed, F/M, Happy Ending, Kinda?, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Vanessa-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-30
Updated: 2019-08-30
Packaged: 2020-09-30 10:10:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20445413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artificialmac/pseuds/artificialmac
Summary: The art of getting him to stay.





	there’s a piece of me that leaves (when you’re gone)

**Author's Note:**

> Works as a companion piece to “At Another Place in Time - You Were Infinitely Mine” from the Residential Neighborhoods series.

She tries not let him phase her anymore.  
She tries to ignore the clawing in her chest when he dances.

It doesn’t work.

She had resigned herself to sitting backstage and peering through the curtain to catch a glimpse of his face.  
She had resigned herself to crying alone into an empty bottle at Silky’s apartment.

She had resigned herself to turn love poems into song lyrics  
and channel them in performances  
and pretend she never met him

except when he passes by on the street  
or he smiles too big for his face  
or his eyes squint up   
or he tilts his head to the side

or he breathes

She will not love him

She will turn away and pretend it doesn’t matter that they shared kisses along the river  
and smiles across a bedsheet  
and texts across the ocean  
and dreams in the dead of night  
and heartbreak in different chests

she will not love him

Not in the way she used to

Because she can’t do that anymore

She can’t love him the same way she loved him when he kissed her good morning  
She can’t love him the same way she loved him when he listened to her ramblings at three in the morning  
She can’t love him the same way she loved him when he was hers

and when she was his

and when everything fit together like it was supposed to  
like it should

like it was always meant to be that way

But they trade small talk over a thrumming bass now  
They share pained looks through stage curtains  
and smiles when the other turns away

they love quietly now

they love just enough to still itch under her skin

they love enough to never get closure

they love enough

and not enough

Because it isn’t enough to quell the growing sense of dread Vanessa feels.   
It isn’t enough to keep her heart from racing when he looks at her just so.  
It isn’t enough to quiet her head from the memories of their last kiss

It isn’t enough to make him stay.

Their love wasn’t enough to make him stay.

It still isn’t enough.

Because he slips out of her hotel room when he thinks she’s asleep.

Or when he knows she’s not. 

She’ll make filthy promises she has no intention of fulfilling, because she knows he’s already made up his mind.  
She says them anyway and pretends it is just sex.

Lies to his face about all the dirty things she wants, when in reality, she only wants him to stay the night.

Wants to hold him when the sun comes up.

Wants to know this is real.

That this isn’t something she’s made up in her head.

That he loves her too.

The he loves her enough.

That he loves her enough to stay this time.

She stops making promises one night.  
For a second it seems like he misses them.

But he shakes himself, returning back to the man she admires, but not the one she loves.

She lets him get to the door, hand on the knob, seconds away from history repeating itself as it had the past five months.

She doesn’t let it.

“Please.”

And history, stops repeating for a moment.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think! Pls and thank.


End file.
